Digvijay clarifies 'tunch maal' remark, says it means pure

Congress leader Digvijay Singh, who has drawn flak for his "tunch maal" remark on woman MP from the party, on Saturday hit out at the media, blaming its "TRP race" for the controversy.

"In its race for TRP rating the media is running amok. A commonly used phrase used for praising a person is being labelled sexist! Deplorable. 100 per cent tanch means 100 per cent pure. And media calls it sexist," he said.

"For a change they should do some introspection instead of gunning for politicians," Singh commented in his two posts on the microblogging site Twitter on morning. Singh had courted a controversy when he described party MP Meenakshi Natarajan "sou tunch khara maal" (totally pure).

"Our party MP, Meenakshi Natrajan is a Gandhian, simple and an honest leader. She keeps going from place to place in her constituency. I am a seasoned smith of politics. Meenakshi sou tunch khara maal hai (totally pure)," the Congress General Secretary had said addressing party workers in Mandsaur town in Madhya Pradesh on Thursday.

Singh's remark were slammed by the Bharatiya Janata Party with party leader Vinay Katiyar saying that he had lost his mental balance and needs treatment urgently. "We have stopped taking Digivijay Singh seriously," BJP spokesperson Meenakshi Lekhi had said.

The Congress found it hard to defend Singh's controversial statements as party spokesperson Renuka Chowdhary ducked a barrage of questions saying she had not heard them. Singh, however, had clarified on Friday that his remark meant that Natrajan was like "pure gold" and threatened to take legal action against TV channels for wrongly reporting it.

Natarajan herself said there's nothing offensive in the comment and it was just a colloquial phase, which should be seen in the context of what the leader had said.